Ingka Group, owner of furniture mega-brand IKEA, has joined the UtsiraVIND offshore wind consortium which is looking to bring floating wind to Norway.
The UtsiraVIND Consortium was first established as a partnership between floating offshore wind technologies provider Odfjell Oceanwind and renewable energy platform Source Galileo.
The consortium has been additionally further strengthened by two new partners – Japanese utility company Kansai and Ingka Investments, the investment arm of Ingka Group. The expanded consortium will be bidding into the Utsira Nord floating offshore wind tender process in September 2023.
The consortium will now seek to progress its bid in the upcoming Utsira tender process to develop, build, and operate a floating wind park on Utsira Nord using Odfjell Oceanwind’s proprietary solutions.
The Utsira Nord seabed lies 32 kilometres offshore in the North Sea where floating wind turbines in water depths of 180 to 280 metres are foreseen to be developed in the first round for a total capacity of 1.5 GW.
“Entering a critical decade for climate action, Ingka Investments has committed to expanding its investments in renewable energy to EUR 6.5bn ($7.1$) as the next step towards 100% renewable energy across the value chain,” the company explained.
Since 2009, Ingka Investments has invested over EUR 3bn into renewable energy projects in wind and solar power, enabling the group to generate more renewable energy than it consumes across its global operations. The aim is to produce 15TWh and support the group’s climate footprint reduction with 6m tons of CO2 compared to the baseline in its fiscal year 2016.
This is Ingka’s fourth investment in offshore wind and first participation in an offshore wind public tender process. Its most recent investment is the acquisition of a 49% stake in its three offshore wind projects in Finland from OX2 for $28m.
